06/30/2017

Where Justice Was Swift, Effective and Forever - The Old Neighborhood

In The Atlantic, Peter Beinart attempts to pack the complex Donald Trump into The Grudge Box.

That need to take action on his enemies characterizes him, posits Beinart.

Well, that also applies to so many of us who grew up on the mean streets of urban areas like 1950s Jersey City, New Jersey. For us that was The Old Neighborhood.

The nostalgia for it hangs heavy because it was a place where justice was swift, effective and forever. No one who grew up there ever considered becoming a lawyer or a cop.

Punk Joe from the O'Brien family on Bay Street in downtown Jersey City puts the moves on the Maria from the Balasco family. Joe gets badly roughed up. To today, the O'Briens and the Balascos find reason to make trouble for each other. That's even though they currently live on different continents.

Trump came of age in a higher-income version of Jersey City - Queens. In those days it still operated like any of the millions of urban neighborhoods. The ethos there, I would assume, called for immediate punishment for crimes such as parking in front of your neighbor's house. After the windshield was broken, the two parties never talked again.

To generations growing up in suburbs, The Grudge wasn't part of their value system. They were socialized to handle things through proper channels and then move on. That's what the Anderson family did on the popular national television program "Father Knows Best."

Head of the household Jim didn't tell his son to round up bats and they'd go after the thugs who allegedly stole bicycles from the backyard. What would have taken place was a cordial visit from a police officer. The episode might end with the younger daughter Kitten declaring around the dinner table (which prefigured the one in "Blue Bloods") that she wanted to join the police force. Everyone smiles. No grudges.

Many of us, including Trump, reloated from The Old Neighborhood. But embedded in us might still be that notion of how conflicts get resolved.